It only makes sense that while I was halfway across the world, E was in the middle of a crisis. When I got back to Corfu, there were butterflies in the air, stray cats sprawled across the warm concrete and a man that had spending time with her late at night. I had only been gone six days, and called her as much as I could given the time difference. She mentioned nothing about the 23 year old tennis instructor who took a curious interest in her. How they ended up on her balcony, alone at 2 AM is a mystery but at the same time I should have seen it coming. I was just like her when I was fourteen, convinced I knew everything about the world, smart enough to say the right things but too foolish to realize why I stood in certain rooms. On some days, she is so much like me that I can only stare at the sky and pray.
By some bizarre chance nothing happened beyond talk on those late night tennis courts, but this man who calls his students his slaves, this coward who courts the attention of teenagers instead of grown women was a fox in the henhouse.
Jetlagged and exhausted, I spoke to her in a low voice. I just wanted the facts, no blame, no anger. Her fantasy of being older and sophisticated crumbled like one of V's sandcastles. All at once, just a girl who fell for the easiest tricks, desperate for attention, lonely and vulnerable. I told her how this was my story too, that it takes years to find a way to navigate these waters without grounding out on the reef. I held her hand as she cried, long, slow big sloppy tears. The damage was done but it could have been a million times worse. One more night might have made all of the difference. How to get her to understand she was lucky, it was beyond me.
That night, I had him pointed out to me. All at once I was back in high school. I know that haircut, that sunburned face, those hands. He sat at a table surrounded by young women that tapped away at their phones. I walk up to him, saying his name and he nods. I gesture to stand up, and speak away from the table. I ask him if he speaks English.
Enough, he says. I ask him if he knows my daughter.
Yes, he says. I ask him what in the world a 23 year old man is doing alone with a 14 year old girl at 2AM. He smirks. He pauses, savoring the moment as my face is turning in on itself. He is a good foot taller than me, and smells of cheap cologne. He mumbles something. I am all Brooklyn now, the cliche angry father. There is no reason for him to be alone with her at 2AM, none. It is simply wrong, I tell him that he knows this already. He smirks, shoulders shrugging, now pretending he does not understand me. I tell him I will report him to the police, that he will be gone by morning. He laughs a little, painting me as the nut job but failing.
Someday you will have a son or a daughter, and you will be me right now, I tell him. There his nothing funny about what I am saying. He is now pretending that he cannot understand me, that I am speaking Latin or Norwegian. My voice raises, no longer a hoarse angry father.
Keep the fuck away from her, or you will regret it. I stalk off, the girls at the table barely bat an eye.
Later, I pass them with V in my arms, E's face turned towards the floor, N next to me. Somehow both fingers jump to my eyes, then point back at him.
I GOT MY EYES ON YOU MOTHERFUCKER. I roar, as everyone left eating at the tables crane their heads.
JUST FUCKING TRY ME. And then his face turns in on itself. I am shaking afterwards, as we find our way up the stairs and back to our room. It all feels so overwrought, so much like a scene in a movie. But maybe there is some truth in these moments, maybe every furious father sounds the same.
Comments